


Lily's Goodbye

by Amalthea_Oberon



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Angst, Feels, fight
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-30
Updated: 2017-08-30
Packaged: 2018-12-21 20:29:35
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 561
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11952039
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Amalthea_Oberon/pseuds/Amalthea_Oberon
Summary: Snape was constantly made fun of, but when he couldn’t take it any more he lashed out against the only person who had ever cared. This is Lily’s side of the story.





	Lily's Goodbye

Five years. It had been five years since that day. An owl, a letter, and a lifetime of change. Severus had been pleased. Petunia had been jealous and angry. Her parents had been surprised and proud.  _ If anyone can do magic in this family, of course it would be you. _ Her life had been completely overturned. In a good way.

Well, mostly.

_ Mudblood _ . It had been quiet, cruel. Full of malice and malintent. And she had run. She had dropped her precious books, her carefully crafted essay, her vials and bottles. She had let her bag, her wand, and her guard fall. And she  _ ran _ .

Past Severus, spiteful.

Past Lucius, laughing.

Past Peter, shocked.

Past Remus, sympathetic.

Past Sirius, angry.

Past James, expression unreadable.

The hallway, the students, the classrooms, the teachers. They had become a blur through her wet eyes.  _ He promised. He promised he wouldn’t. That he’d never. Never. He promised. _

She had found herself in the kitchens, Winky wrapping her in a blanket and pressing tea into her hand. James had come in once, shirt untucked, tie loose, hair in disarray. His lip had been bleeding and his glasses had been crooked. There was dirt on his clothes and his hands had been shaking. He had set down her books, her essay, her bag, her vials and bottles magiced back to normal and most importantly her wand on the table next to her.

And she had turned to him and cried. Really, truly cried.

One pair of arms surrounded her. Then another. And two more. James, Remus, Peter, and Sirius.

“I’m sorry. I was wrong. He was wrong. We were all wrong.”

**********************

“Lily!” Severus chased her from class to class, desperation in his voice and face.

“Leave it, Snape.” Marlene, ever protective Marlene, barred the way

“But--”

She slammed the door.

**********************

Severus had been waiting for hours outside the library, waiting long after curfew had passed. James and the rest had gone to bed, leaving her with a few minutes of peace which she had desperately begged for. He sat waiting behind a suit of armor, hoping to catch her.

“Lily.”

“Go away, Sev.”

“But--”

“I said go!”

“Look. I never meant to call you Mudblood, it just--”

“Slipped out? It's too late. I've made excuses for you for  _ years _ . None of my friends can understand why I even talk to you. You and your precious little Death Eater friends… You've chosen your way, I've chosen mine.”

“They don’t mean anything to me, you do.”

“Do I? Do I really? Then answer me these: When did you last stand up to them? When did you last defend someone they were judging, attacking, ridiculing, or in all other ways belittling? When did you start using  _ their  _ terms? And when did you become okay with it? But, most importantly, when did you decide, among all our desire and searching for and pining after acceptance and power and friends, did you decide it was at all okay for you to break your promise to me? The one where you promised you would never treat me like I was less? The one where you claimed you would never treat  _ anyone _ like they were less? The one where you promised you would become better than your father?”

Her questions were met with silence. The kind of silence that doesn’t get broken.

“Goodbye, Severus.”


End file.
